The Asian woman story
Sharon, in Çafe Shapira' at the Suburban of Tel-Aviv.
A few years ago, I went with a friend of mine to ‘Café Shapira’ in Tel-Aviv for dinner. That particular day of the week, there was an Asian food stand supervised by an Asian woman. We approached her, and ordered a big plate. I was curious about the food and casually asked her the name of the traditional dish in Chinese?
Well… that was an embarrassing moment for me, I must admit.
She was looking at me half smiling, my friend was looking at me with a smirk, then they both told me she is Japanese.
HO NO! That was so embarrassing! I wanted to burry myself!
‘That’s OK’, the nice lady said. “Most of the people from my area, have barely heard about the Jews nor the Israelis, and we have a certain word to describe ’Israel’, it sounds like a combination between the words ‘Muslim’ and ‘Israel’. The Japanese word means that in this area lives Muslims.
It was a very humbling experience for me. The fact that my great legacy is just another grain of sand in this endless existence. And ironically, Asian cloture dominates a much greater section, and unfortunately, I know almost nothing about it.
